Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

I always liked "Mellow Yellow" and "Sunshine Superman" and -- dare I say it? -- "Jennifer Juniper!" "Atlantis" has a bit too much of Spinal Tap's "Stonehenge" about it for me to hear it with a straight face.

Not if you heard Atlantis first, decades ago.

And it was first, way before Stonehenge and those hippie Druid characters saw their first Solstice.

Oh, I did hear Atlantis first. I guess I should say that I can't listen to it in retrospect since "Tap."

I saw Donovan once in Madison Square Garden (somewhere around '72 or '73?). Part of the show was just him and an acoustic guitar and a guy on viola.

The lad is definitely talented, but these days I just cant bring myself to listen to his old stuff. Too wimpy.

I'm in there with both youse guys. Dave, "Break like the Wind" was my all time favorite early '90s album. I've always been a big Harry Shearer and Christopher Guest fan. They nailed the essence, the divinity and the silliness of heavy metal perfectly, and the production values of the album were great. Dweezil Zappa's guitar work is right on the money. The writing and arrangements are classic. "***** School" was actually protested by NOW, who seemed to miss the whole point of the parody.

Harry's wife is a well-known Welsh acoustic performer.

Donovan was perhaps the first wooly-headed "sensitive" solo male hippie act, with his flowery shirts and even flowerier lyrics and instrumentation. For my money, he played that "sensitive" card too heavy and too early, but it took guts to put "Hurdy Gurdy Man" out as a single, I'll give him that!

I saw him back in the day, at one of biggest venues out here, the Forum. He sat center stage, white robes, incense, flowers galore. Forced us all to meditate before he started. It was of it's time. Lotsa pot in the bleachers. Then I saw him early '80s, small, I mean dinky club. That was far better (IMO), he was self effacing, joked about his songs, those hippie daze, and talked about the songs he wrote and some of his pals. Asked if we wanted to hear the verse for Hurdy Gurdy Man that George Harrison had written, then sang it. Good thing he left it out (sorry George)!

Donovan may be wimpy, but chicks dig him...a lot of chicks...

Strangely enough we were asked to play Mellow Yellow when we doing a gig in Port Angeles Wa. in the sixties. Our drummer Dave Wilson, (sometime later he recorded an album with Heart) who normally did not sing much volunteered to do the vocals and we found a kazoo in our bag of tricks. So with an acoustic, a kazoo and a high spirited drummer singing lead we fabricated a version of Mellow Yellow on the spot. It was an instant hit. We repeatedly got asked to play that song throughout the evening. The women in the audience loved it. Who would have thunk it?

It was nice to do for a lark but it never made our play list.

Oh yeah, Mellow Yellow remains a crowd pleaser to this day...somethin' about the sleaziness in the chromatic cord change, I guess, and the groove's pretty sleazy too, if you're playin' it at the right tempo...

I played it onstage at Icestock with the lyrics changed, and made it into a salute to a frequently served specialty of the Philipinos on the galley crew: "Pork Adobo".

That line about th' 'Ee-lec-tric-al Adobo' pretty much slayed 'em...

It's got a lot of pent up energy in it also.

Three comments here:

1. The very first song I ever dedicated to my wife at a live show (she wasn't even my girlfriend then) was "Mellow Yellow." I still regret that it wasn't a more profound, romantic tune.

2. I was trying to get into a club as a solo perfomer in Guelph, Ontario many years ago, and it was difficult to get a show at this venue. The band booker's name was Lalena and when I said " Are you named after the Donovan tune?" she flipped. Her parents were old hippies and she was indeed named after the tune. I instantly got the gig and she told me that I was the first person that had ever asked her that (incidentally I had a great, fun show there). So I'd have to say "Lalena" is my favourite Donovan tune.

3.Anybody familiar with Dylan's run-in with Donovan in the hotel in the biographical film "Don't Look Back?" My memory is a little sketchy on this one (I'm pretty sure it was that film) but I remember being highly amused at the encounter.

I do like his songs, the hits and album cuts I've heard. I've read his most recent stuff is quite good. The reviews were good enough to make me want to buy.

I have read something about Dylan and Donovan, all I remember is that Dylan was not impressed with Donovan at all, thought he was kind of a Dylan light.